'''Wowpedia''' is a Warcraft [[wiki]], officially [[Wikipedia:Fork (software development)|forked]] from [[WoWWiki]] as of 20 October 2010. It is not hosted by or in any way affiliated with [[Wikia]], the company which hosts WoWWiki.

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'''Wowpedia''' is a Warcraft [[wiki]], officially [[Wikipedia:Fork (software development)|forked]] from [[WoWWiki]] as of 20 October 2010. It is not hosted by or in any way affiliated with [[Wikia]], the company which hosts WoWWiki.

Revision as of 04:17, October 30, 2010

Contents

Wowpedia is a Warcraft wiki, officially forked from WoWWiki as of 20 October 2010. It is not hosted by or in any way affiliated with Wikia, the company which hosts WoWWiki.

Background

WoWWiki originally started as an independent site, but moved to Wikia in 2007. Due to irreconcilable differences with Wikia, members of the WoWWiki community resolved in October 2010 that they would leave Wikia. Their preference at the time was to remove WoWWiki itself from the Wikia network, taking the domain and WoWWiki name with them, but Wikia policy is to not remove wikis from use when they leave. As Wikia refused to sell the domain name, a new site was set up, and Curse offered to host it.

Wowpedia's initial database contained a complete copy of articles from WoWWiki as of 18 October 2010. Edits made to WoWWiki after that date will not automatically appear on Wowpedia and vice versa. Due to this, articles should vary over time between the two sites, further differentiating them from one another. (For example, Wowpedia contains an article on N'Zoth, an Old God mentioned at Blizzcon, while WoWWiki contains next to nothing.)

Differences

There are a number of differences between WoWWiki and Wowpedia, some imperceptible to the lay user. The most obvious are that, on Wowpedia, the sidebar is in its original place and there is no fixed width. There will be no ads on Wowpedia for the first two months, and after that it will have a single, non-obtrusive banner ad at the top of every page.

Reception

The decision to move was unanimous among WoWWiki's administrators, minus Kirkburn, who is a Wikia staff member. Virtually all of the site's active users have transferred to Wowpedia, but you are free to stay with WoWWiki or even contribute to both sites.

Wikia officially has no plans to close WoWWiki and has begun installing administrators from their other sites to replace those that shifted to Wowpedia. They have also started giveaways in an attempt to save the old site. There have been periodic server difficulties with the new site due to the amount of traffic, but Curse have purchased new servers specifically for Wowpedia.

During the transition phase, there was a disagreement over WoWWiki administrators leaving messages to people informing them about the new site. This issue has yet to be resolved. There have also been forum rumors that Curse is behind the site's move, but these rumors are unfounded; the community long had issues with Wikia and considered hosting the new site on their own until Curse offered to help them out.

Reclaiming your user name

In addition to WoWWiki's content, Wowpedia contains a copy of the user database and has a tool to 'reclaim' your user name. All you have to do is click on the 'Log in/create account' button and it should say 'Have a WoWWiki account? Reclaim it.' Once you click on the reclaim link and put in your information, the site will generate a code; you can enter this code in an edit summary on your WoWWiki user page to confirm your identity. Remember that the code must be placed in the edit summary and not the actual page. You must make some sort of change to the page for it to show up. If desired, you may add {{Delete my user pages}} which will flag the old page for deletion.

No edits made prior to 18 October 2010 are lost once you make the transition. The entire history up to that point, including your user page and any subpages, will be intact.